In 1954, The International Commission on Snow and Ice (ICSI) of the International Association of Scientific Hydrology (IASH) issued this first version of the “The international classification for snow (with special reference to snow on the ground)“. The document was published as “Technical Memorandum No. 31 by the Associate Committee on Soil and Snow Mechanics, National Research Council, Ottawa, Canada.“.
Vincent Schaefer (USA), George Klein (Canada), and Marcel de Quervain (Switzerland) put together three slightly different approaches to one “basic framework which may be expanded or contracted to suit the needs of any particular group ranging from scientists to skiers“.
It is worth to note that this spirit survives through to the most recent guide on measurement of snow (see
GIMO).
International Association of Cryospheric Sciences